


Photographs Don't Lie

by TheLadyMagician



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Cullen is shy, Dorian is an idiot, First Kiss, Idiots in Love, M/M, Modern AU, Moving, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-11
Updated: 2015-05-11
Packaged: 2018-03-30 01:23:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3917980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLadyMagician/pseuds/TheLadyMagician
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dorian hates moving with a passion. After about five minutes he decides to take a break and go through some of his boxes. Who knew going through photographs could be so enlightening? </p><p> </p><p>  <i>based off the prompt: Person A looking through selfies of themselves and Person B, blushing each time because they notice that Person B is never looking at the camera. Instead, they have their eyes focused on A the whole time</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Photographs Don't Lie

**Author's Note:**

  * For [elidoo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elidoo/gifts).



> This is for elidoo who is a magnificent enabler. 
> 
> Also, I think this is the first thing I've ever written in present tense, so please let me know if there are any mistakes!

Moving was on Dorian's 'Never again' list. Yes, that potentially meant living in a run-down home on the wrong side of Haven with far too many roommates but he didn't particularly care if it meant not lugging boxes to and fro. 

It doesn't help that most of what he owns are books. After the third box he was ready to live in Bull's truck if that's what it took. He was just glad that he had a room on the bottom floor. Cassandra was lugging a punching bag up the stairs and Dorian was left thanking Andraste he didn't have to deal with that. 

Bull was the lucky one to get the little outside studio that wasn't connected to the house. Dorian hates where his room is situated if only because his room is right next to Cullen's. It means he'll have to be a bit more discreet in some of his nightly fantasies and honestly, Dorian likes to be anything but discreet. 

But that's what leaving for a week to visit friends will do. Dorian hopes Felix was happy with his brief appearance because he clearly can't trust his roommates not to make terrible decisions while he's gone. 

Dorian sets the box he is holding down onto his bed and collapses on the mattress. _As good a time as any to take a break,_ Dorian thinks. If he simply waits around long enough, Cullen will eventually just bring all of his boxes in. The ex-Templar is good like that, a bit easy to take advantage of, but Cullen had lines and he was more than willing to let Dorian know when he crossed them. 

'Dorian, we can't dye all of Cassandra's clothes. Dorian, we can't file down the tips of Bull's horns.' And Dorian's personal favorite, 'Dorian, we can't just walk in to a cemetery so you can practice raising the dead.'

Honestly, it's like Cullen doesn't trust the mage. Raising the dead would be for science, after all. 

Dorian unpacks the box on his bed. It's filled with decorations of all sorts but mostly photographs of Dorian and his friends. Specifically selfies of Dorian because it's a crime that Dorian is not in front of the camera more often. It's a slight he takes upon himself to rectify. He includes his friends mostly because he's still rather shocked he those at all. 

The first framed picture Dorian pulls out is of him and Bull at the bowling alley. Bull and Cassandra took the game seriously, Dorian had no idea how the stupid thing was played, and Cullen was only there because the internet at their old place hadn't been turned on yet. The picture was mostly Bull because the behemoth takes up most of the lens space. Dorian's smiling face is crunched to the side as he clearly struggled to take the picture. Cullen is in the background sitting on the terrible plastic blue chairs of the alley and looking at the two men in exasperated fondness. 

The next photo Dorian pulls out is of Cassandra looking irritated as Dorian gave her a large peck on the cheek. It was during their first Wicked Grace game on father's day. None of them particularly wanted to do anything on the damn day so they got drunk and gambled their sorrows away. Josephine claims she won the day but no one was sober enough to verify her claim. She was in the background of the picture, draped over Cullen who had a hand in her hair. The Commander was looking at Cassandra with a frown. 

The next picture was of Lavellan, Cullen, and Dorian. Dorian was in the middle with his arm around Lavellan as he leaned into Cullen's shoulder. Lavellan was grinning widely at the camera with Dorian. Cullen was smiling but not looking at Dorian's camera, instead he was turned slightly to the mage. His eyes were tender and Cullen's face looked so soft and open that Dorian swear he feels heat rising to his cheeks. That would be preposterous, of course. Cullen is the one who blushes unnecessarily. Dorian is _not_ blushing because of some faux emotion he's imagining on the Commander's face in a picture. 

Dorian digs through the box, looking through the pictures for ones of just him and Cullen. One is not hard to find. It's of them at Solas's slam poetry while they waited for the elf to come on stage. Dorian was making a face at the camera to indicate exactly what he thought of slam poetry. And Cullen....

Cullen was looking at him. Those gold eyes were focused on the mage like the sun rose and fell with Dorian. 

Heat rises in Dorian's cheeks until he's sure that his whole face is as red as Leliana's hair. So Cullen looked at him like that in one or two pictures? It means nothing. 

Dorian digs through the box to find more photos. There's a rolodex type one that holds about thirty pictures....

And Cullen is gazing at him in every single one. Not some of them. Not most. _All._ His expression ranges from exasperation to irritation to happiness, but in each single photo there's an underlying current of something far too delicate for Dorian to name. 

"Fasta vass," Dorian mutters and throws the frame onto his bed and races from his room to the one right next door. Cullen's room consists of a bed already made, a myriad of boxes, and his battered chess table. The Commander is nowhere to be found. 

Dorian walks to the chess table and moves the pieces to their taped spots. Instead of stopping the game, Dorian and Cullen had taped the chessboard with the positions of all their pieces. Which is stupid because it's clear that Dorian is going to lose. It has been clear that Dorian is going to lose for the past twenty moves but the Commander hasn't made his winning move yet....

It is that exact moment that Dorian decides he's a fucking idiot. 

"Dorian?" Cullen's voice calls from the doorway. Dorian turns to look at the man carrying three boxes in, balancing them precariously on his arms to peek around the cardboard to look at the mage. "Cheating already?"

"Are those fragile?" Dorian asks as steps to Cullen, heart beating as hard as a dragon's wings. "The boxes?"

"What?" Cullen asks with a frown. "No, it's clothes. Why?"

"Wonderful." Dorian grabs the top two boxes and tosses them onto Cullen's bed. Cullen hands him the third box with a look of bemusement and it too gets thrown onto the bed. With the only barrier between and Cullen gone, the mage surges to the Commander, wrapping one arm around his waist and burying another in those glorious curls. Dorian leaves his lips one inch apart from Cullen's own and locks eyes with the ex-Templar, giving the man an out if Dorian read all the signs wrong. But Cullen's eyes are filled with that same soft emotion from the pictures and Cullen brings an arm around Dorian's waist. 

It's all the incentive Dorian needs to crush his lips against Cullen's, biting back a whimper as Cullen returned the gentle pressure. It's just a sweet press of his lips against the Commander's chapped ones and Dorian is trembling as Cullen hesitantly raises his hand to cup the back of Dorian's neck. 

Dorian pulls away a hair's breadth, just enough so he can speak. "You could have said something earlier, Commander."

"I didn't know I was being subtle," Cullen replies and ghosts his lips over Dorian's, gripping Dorian's waist a little tighter. "I thought you didn't-. You never-."

"I'm a Maker forsaken idiot." Dorian kisses the man properly this time, Cullen's mouth easily yielding to his. It's glorious, it's sweet, and it's so much of everything Dorian doesn't deserve but he's enough of a selfish asshole to never let it go as long as he has it. 

Dorian pulls Cullen towards the bed, never allowing their lips to part as he reached blindly behind him to shove the boxes to the floor. Despite Cullen being at least twice as strong as Dorian, he was pliant as the mage turned them and eased Cullen onto the bed to straddle him. 

If Dorian didn't need to breathe he would keep his lips locked onto Cullen's until Thedas itself was obliterated. "Alright?" Dorian asks Cullen whose eyes are a bit glazed and face is flushed in such a perfectly debauched way that Dorian has no choice but to kiss at Cullen's defined jawline. 

"Maker above, yes," Cullen hisses. He tilts his head back to give Dorian more space to kiss and nip and this man will ruin him, Dorian thinks. Dorian isn't supposed to get what he wants and here it is in the most flawless package imaginable, moaning out his name. 

A stream of water hits Dorian in the back of his head and he scrambles off of Cullen to glare at Cassandra who was holding a spray bottle. Bull is right behind her smirking but also shaking his head. The Seeker glowers at the two, the distaste increasing in her gaze as Cullen wraps an arm around Dorian and pulls him back against his chest. 

"I'm thrilled you two finally figured it out, but I refuse to live above your noise." Dorian isn't sure how she made "noise" sound exactly like "inconvenient and not to be discussed sexual activities" but there it is. "Bull, bring your stuff inside. Dorian, Cullen, you can take the studio outside."

 _Well, that's a bit fast, isn't it?_ Dorian thinks. They just shared a kiss and now were supposed to move in to the same room? Dorian opens his mouth to tell the Seeker that it wouldn't be necessary but Cullen covers Dorian's mouth with his hand. 

"Thank you, Cassandra."

Bull groans and sags his shoulders. "You two couldn't have figured it out an hour ago?" he asks as he leaves the room. 

Perhaps there are some good reasons to move after all.

**Author's Note:**

> As always, thank you for reading! You guys are literally the reason I keep writing. Kudos and comments are greatly appreciated and help me write more Cullrian related fiction. 
> 
> You can find me on [tumblr ](http://www.the-lady-magician.tumblr.com) where I take prompts like this one and reblog all the Dragon Age things!


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